/*
 * DO NOT ALTER OR REMOVE COPYRIGHT NOTICES OR THIS HEADER.
 *
 * This file is part of retabel.
 *
 * Copyright (c) 2011 by individual contributors as indicated by the
 * @author tags. See the copyright.txt file in the distribution
 * for a full listing of individual contributors.
 *
 * This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
 * under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License as
 * published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2.1 of
 * the License, or (at your option) any later version.
 *
 * This software is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
 * but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
 * MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU
 * Lesser General Public License for more details.
 *
 * You should have received a copy of the GNU Lesser General Public
 * License along with this software; if not, write to the Free
 * Software Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin St, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA
 * 02110-1301 USA, or see the FSF site: http://www.fsf.org.
 */

package org.retabel.persistence.dao;

import java.util.List;

/**
 * Generic superclass for all dao's.
 * <p/>
 * <h3>Extra-Info</h3>
 * Created: 15:40 26.08.11
 *
 * @author Burt Parkers
 * @version 1.0
 */
public interface AbstractEntityDao<T> {

    /**
     * Persists an entity.
     *
     * @param entity the entity to persist.
     */
    void create(T entity);

    /**
     * Merges an entity.
     *
     * @param entity the entity to merge.
     * @return returns the entity.
     */
    T merge(T entity);

    /**
     * Removes a entity.
     *
     * @param entity the entity to remove.
     */
    void remove(T entity);

    /**
     * Finds an entity by it's primary key.
     *
     * @param id the primary key.
     * @return the entity or null if the entity does not exist.
     */
    T find(Object id);

    /**
     * Returns all entities.
     *
     * @return a collection with all entities, empty if no entity exists.
     */
    List<T> findAll();

    /**
     * Returns a specific range of entities.
     *
     * @param from       index from
     * @param maxResults index the maximum number of retrieved results
     * @return a collection of entities starting from index from up to a maximum of maxResults
     */

    List<T> findRange(int from, int maxResults);

    /**
     * Returns the entity count.
     *
     * @return count of all entities.
     */
    int count();
}
